


The Transient

by Hannahmayski



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Badass Zuko (Avatar), Gen, I would love to write more for this au tbh, Iroh is there and he is able to teach zuko the truth a lot quicker, Let Zuko Rest, Misty Palms Oasis, Order of the White Lotus, Pai Sho, Secret Societies, Si Wong Desert, Zuko is a member of the white lotus, and hoped he would die bc he can't survive on his own, didn't give him a crew or anything, fung is so badass, he's been on some mission for the order, he's not on his 'i must capture the avatar' phase bc ozai just banished him, iroh is in ba sing se and zuko needs to meet up with him, just dropped him off somewhere in the earth kingdom, zuko is so tired
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-08 17:51:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18628258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hannahmayski/pseuds/Hannahmayski
Summary: Fung isn’t sure what it is about the young man that sets him on edge, only that the second he steps into the cantina, the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.(AU. Zuko is a part of the Order of the White Lotus.)





	The Transient

**Author's Note:**

> I will check this over for errors later, don't @ me I'm doing my best

The soft hum of chatter of a pub is mind-numbing to some, annoying to others, and to the few, the noise is something they thrive in.

The Misty Palms Oasis has seen better days and the same can be said about the tiny, and only cantina in the village. It's walls are the same dulled out yellow as the ground and the ceiling and the tables and the slabs of rock that forms the seats. It’s curved roof gives the cantina an almost suffocating feeling, as though a private conversation is impossible.

But it also serves as a funnel of information and Fung’s ideal place to sit and just _listen._ People relax in places like this, where the air’s a bit cooler and the people are a bit more friendly than anyone you’d find out in the Si Wong Desert and with a cool drink in the hand, lips begin to loosen and words start flying.

Fung just sits, and listens, welcoming an inconspicuous Pai Sho game when someone feels the restless need to do something other than down another drink. The games are usually just that – games. And sometimes, the games are much more.

Fung isn’t sure what it is about the young man that sets him on edge, only that the second he steps into the cantina, the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. It’s a feeling of wariness, like Fung should keep an eye on him in particular.

The man is too skinny, Fung can tell even from where he sits a few metres away. The tattered, filthy remains of his clothes hang off him. But the most prominent feature is the horrific scar that marks his face.

It’s not uncommon to have scarred individuals, especially with the war, but a burn of that magnitude to the face can’t be anything but _personal_ and it would have to be from the hands of a Firebender to cause that much damage with that much precision. 

Out in the desert, it’s also not _that_ uncommon to have a scraggler Firebender wander in. It’s a rare phenomenon, traitor Firebenders, but Fung’s met a fair few in his travels and time in Misty Palms Oasis.

The man looks around, eyeing every individual. His pale skin glows eerily in the yellow light.

His gaze eventually drifts over to Fung, and for a moment, he can do nothing more than stare back. He slowly wanders over, his eyes boring into Fung’s and he can’t tear his eyes away.

The man sits down opposite him, movements stiff and painful, and a flicker of discomfort flies across his face before it’s ruthlessly wiped away. “May I have this game?” he asks.

It’s a little rude, Fung notes, to sit down and then ask, but perhaps the man is simply desperate to get off his feet.

“The guest has the first move,” he echoes back in a well-practised tone of neutrality.

The man picks up a tile, his hands a mess of cuts and bruises of daily living in the harsh Si Wong Desert and far too skeletal for Fung’s liking, and reaches outward to the centre of the board. It takes Fung a second too long to respond as he looks at the tile. His mind comes to a confused halt.

The lotus tile sits carefully in the centre, staring back up at him. Fung looks up, his face doesn’t change, and suddenly it seems extremely important that he doesn’t scare this individual off, and he thinks a reaction will have the man gone long before Fung would ever be close to stopping him.

“I see you favour the White Lotus gambit,” Fung says. More practised words but rarely is such a young one at it’s receiving end.

“Not many still cling to the ancient ways.” Fung presses his hands together and leans forward ever so slightly, sweat from the inescapable heat make his palms stick together and then he peels them apart so his palms are both upwards.

Fung watches the young man carefully because this is the test - whether the young man perhaps is merely fond of an old strategy or if he has ties to the reason Fung is sitting in a dimly lit cantina in the middle of the desert listening into people’s conversations - _the Order of the White Lotus._

The man leans in carefully, stiff muscles allowing him next to no give and he presses his hands together and mimics Fung’s movements.

“Those who do can always find a friend,” he says. His voice is painfully raspy like he’s been swallowing the sand itself from his time in the desert.

Fung takes a breath, barely noticeable. If this incredibly young man has ties to the Order, an unlikely event in itself, he still has yet to prove it. “Then let us play,” he says.

It’s surprisingly quick, if slowed down slightly by the young one’s own inability to get his muscles to move as quickly and smoothly as he would like. But his hand picks up each tile placing them in the right spots in the right order without a single hesitation and Fung can’t help but be impressed.

The White Lotus is an old group filled with old members and a young face is welcome, but rare. Fung has never cared much for the ins and outs of people’s stories or who they were before they came to be a part of the White Lotus, but this young man with his ghostly, Fire-like skin and disfigured face, he can’t imagine how he’s managed to end up where he is and he desperately wants to know.

Fung places the last tile on the board and they both pull back to see the shape of the familiar lotus in front of them.

“Welcome brother. The White Lotus opens wide to those who know her secrets,” Fung says. At this, the man does not respond, but he does not need too. He meets his eyes again, and instead of that near palpable intensity, Fung can see relieved exhaustion.

It’s not surprising. The Si Wong Desert is a difficult, perilous trek for anyone outside a Sandbender, and even more so if one’s descent is from the Fire Nation, which Fung can’t see this man being anything but. After all, there are no laws in the desert. It’s simply you, the knife in your hand and the entire world that wants you dead.

Fung can’t begin to understand what it’s like, for a Fire Nation man to be wondering the Earth Kingdom and he won’t even pretend to.

At least Fung knows his people, knows he has allies. Where this man is a wolf, hiding among a pack of lions.

Fung reaches over, collecting the Pai Sho tiles up slowly and he takes the opportunity to take stock of him to a greater degree - there are swords strapped to his back with well worn, but clearly well-loved handles. The burn on his face is horrific up close, a dark red that won’t heal any further, twisting the leathery skin so it cascades across his face as lumps. His ear is shrivelled and deformed and he can’t open his eye beyond a squint. His hair is recently shaved so that the thick black strands stand on end.

If Fung had not known the typical makeup of Fire Nation blood and was not a member of a secret organisation who specialises in _people,_ he’s sure he would have brushed him off as another refugee.  

“Follow me,” Fung says once the tiles are stacked up in a neat pile and he stands up, gesturing to the man to do so as well.

They walk out of the cantina, making for the door. He keeps his companion close, never stepping ahead more than a few paces in front of him. The man keeps up, but if the desert been’s treating him as poorly as it does to all those that try to cross it, Fung doesn’t want to aggravate anything that’s already hurting.

The meeting room is a walk away. Far enough away from the cantina and inconspicuous enough that it looks what the inside portrays itself to be - a flower shop. The man stays by his side the whole walk, staying behind just enough to let Fung lead him.

“Do you have a name, brother?” Fung asks. It’s easier to let that blank facade of indifference that’s crucial to maintain in the cantina drop, out of sight of prying eyes.

“Li,” the man says easily. It rolls off his tongue in that well-practised way of habit, much like Fung’s time in the cantina where dialogue is rarely anything more than a script in his head, spoken a million times over.

Fung nods, reaching out to the door and shuffling Li inside. Fung closes the door Li turns around, his left side faces Fung, and it makes Li look far beyond the years he could have possibly lived.

“Zuko,” He says. These words come out like poison, as though the word hasn’t touched his lips in years and perhaps it hasn’t, given the tight look plastered on his face.

“My real name is Zuko. My uncle is Iroh, the Grand Lotus. He’s in Ba Sing Se and I need to get to him, If you can’t help me then I have no business here," he's fast and to the point, no beating around his purpose and no time for small talk..

He schools his features, not letting the surprise echo across his face. A young member is one thing, but a young member related to Grand Lotus Iroh is a whole other. Fung would be insulted at Zuko’s sharp tongue, but if he’d been walking through the desert for as long as he clearly has then he’s sure he'd be just as short.

The Si Wong Desert isn’t called the Desert of the Dead just to entertain the locals.

“Of course,” Fung says, already turning around. “Come into the meeting room, and we can work out the finer details.” To talk about such matters where there is a possibility of being overheard is not a risk Fung is willing to take, and plus, the meeting room is always a good few degrees cooler than the outside temperature. 

Fung has heard vague stories from other members he’s run into over the last couple of years. Stories of now another member of the Royal Family defected, how another member was working for them, but the information was vague at best.

He’s also heard the stories of the banished prince of the Fire Nation, disfigured and cast out of his home. Banished and broken and never heard from again. Fung had thought the stories to be an embellishment of the truth, but as he looks at Zuko’s face as he walks into their meeting room, knowing that his _uncle_ is the brother of the Fire Lord, he can’t be anyone else.

When Fung joined the White Lotus, he knew that this was it, this was how he could contribute to the war effort. Never in a way that would lead him to be leading soldiers, commanding armies, or strategising the winning battle.

No one will know his name in his spot out here in the Si Wong Desert. No one will know his age, his mother, his father or the town he grew up in when he finally dies. But someone has to be the middleman. Someone has to get the people who _will_ be fighting the battles and uniting the armies to fight the war and collecting critical information to where they need to be. And there is not a doubt in his mind that Zuko’s life is far more important than he can understand at this moment.

Fung pulls the door shut behind him, and he knows that assisting Zuko will be, at the very least, an honour.

**Author's Note:**

> Yes. hello. Fung is my life, and I would die for him. 
> 
> Anyway my idea for this AU is that Zuko was doing some secret shit for the White Lotus and he needs to get to Iroh in Ba Sing Se and Fung (the guy that helps Zuko and Iroh get to Ba Sing Se in canon) is his ticket. 
> 
> I hecking love secret organisations and I love the idea of this old guy hanging out in some seedy bar in the middle of nowhere who's low key a member of a secret organisation? So I had to write something about him. 
> 
> This AU doesn't have to be this one shot. If you want more, let me know!
> 
> Also stay tuned for my Dai Li fic (it doesn't include Zuko this time. Shocking.) it's taking over my every thought. 
> 
> Please come cry/yell at me in these locations:  
> [A twitter for writing](https://twitter.com/echoswriting)  
> [A twitter for fandom stuff](https://twitter.com/tinyecho_)  
> [Pillowfort!](https://www.pillowfort.io/Echowrites)
> 
> ONE LAST THING I have [a pinterest](https://www.pinterest.com.au/hannahmayski/) where I have boards on my fics (both published and wips) if you wanna check that out!!


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